I always get questions on how bad is chemotherapy. How do I know if the chemo drugs are totally out of my system? Or comments like “You look good now so I guess chemo drugs must be out of you, Looking at how good you look now, chemo must not be that bad…”
Comments like this always made me want to slap the person’s face! Sorry, my inner bitch is coming out😝!
When I first started chemotherapy, all my nails started to turn black as the drugs get more and more into my system week after week. My nerves on my fingers and toes started to get numb making me unable to feel the temperature of things that I am holding. It got to a point whereby my whole body nerves started to give me issues after my breast conservation operation and I was not able to walk due to the pain medication given to me.
1.5 years down the road after my last chemotherapy, the nerves on some of my fingers and toes are still numb but there are 1 to 2 are starting to get back some sensation. At times, when I am seated on the toilet seat for too long, my lower half of my body will become dead weight and I need to carry my legs in order to stand. So if you are out with me and I am taking a little long in the ladies, just bear with me as my legs need some time to get the blood to flow😂. Most of my nails are back to normal except for a few that are starting to return to the normal colour. I am always painting my nails because I hate to look at my black nails which serves as a reminder to me that I am still at war with cancer.
I am counting down to the day when these 2 nails are back to normal 😁.
Besides all these, the hair growth is also very very slow. The doctors always tell me, “don’t worry the hair will grow back back”. I know! But when?? When will my whole head of hair be finally back? If you see me now, its either I am wearing a cap or using hair make up to cover up the part that is very thin. I still remembered the 1st day I took off my beanie and used hair make up. The feeling is ‘liberating’! I asked a good friend of mine to take a photo with me and a few days later, I took photo with my group of besties:) Must make use of every small thing to make life memorable:)❤️
1st day using hair make up.
Me without hair make up.
Can you see how much chemo has done to my body, inside and outside? SO PLEASE STOP TELLING ME THAT HEY YOU LOOK GOOD NOW SO I GUESS CHEMO IS ACTUALLY OKAY.
If anyone has a choice, they would probably not touch chemo. But because we have no choice so we had to bite the bullet and endured it.
If you know of anyone going through chemo now, just tell them, “You are so brave”, “I don’t know what to say but I will support you mentally” or just give them a hug or a pat on their back, that will be more than enough. Because 1-2 years down the road after chemo, they still need to suffer the side effects of chemo.😊
Journey of Wendy 